Kia Amanti

Eager to mature, Kia lays a patch right into Leisure World.

March 2004
By
AARON ROBINSON

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Mobile luxury in Asia has always skewed slightly baroque. The region is one of the last bastions of the formal sedan, big and square and filigreed with chrome. Jaywalk any street in Tokyo or Seoul and you'll be dodging one, lace doilies draped over the headrests and gloved chauffeur behind the wheel.

In the 1970s, Toyota and Nissan plumped up their U.S. model lines by bringing over a few of these floaters in the form of the Toyota Crown and Cressida and the Datsun 810 (later the Nissan Maxima). A couple of years ago, a similarly eager-to-mature Hyundai brought us the XG350. Now, bright-eyed Kia, a subsidiary of Hyundai and just 10 years young in America, wants to frolic with the other senior citizens.

The Amanti is bigger than a Camry and base-priced in the mid-20s, right where the V-6 Honda Accord rear-ends the Toyota Avalon. Various angles suggest that tracing paper was put to a Buick LeSabre, a Jaguar S-type, and a Sunbeam waffle iron. There's enough sponge in the suspension to let drivers scoop up dimes off the road in tight right-handers. Let's give a Leisure World welcome to the Kia Amanti!

Kia's front men concede that America is not waiting breathlessly for a Korean Lincoln. The company's U.S. managers still dream about roadsters and pickup trucks. They planned to show a Sorento-based pickup concept at the Chicago show in February. They want Kia to lure the young and the reluctant to age. The redesigned 2004 Spectra promises to do that, with a slippery new five-door wagon in the mix and a catalog of hop-up parts planned.

Kia's assembled MBAs had their work cut out when the home office e-mailed to say the 4100-pound Kia Opirus executive barge was coming stateside bearing the new Amanti name. The two-plus-ton weight alone, the byproduct of thick steel and widespread cast iron, suggests the Opirus isn't exactly state-of-the-art carmaking. Our Amanti was a porcine 559 pounds heavier than the slightly smaller Lexus ES300 (August 2002).

Kia's U.S. branch suggested changes to the Opirus to suit Yankee driving tastes, including sharper steering. They also churned out rationales for a skeptical motoring media.

"I don't know of any company that's successful selling just entry-level cars," said Peter Butterfield, president and CEO of Kia Motors America. "You have to have a fairly wide spread of products."

"Most people think we just sell small cars to college kids," added Wally Anderson, vice-president of marketing. "So this is evolving the brand."

The presentation gradually became more polished and plausible, with only the occasional logical leap. Here's Anderson, explaining how 40-to-60-year-old males, the Amanti's target audience, think differently from typical luxury-sedan buyers, who average 67 years: "The attitude is 'I don't want my father's full-size sedan.' Full-size sedan is a dirty word to these people. The Amanti is not a full-size sedan."

The assembly of auto writers at the Amanti's launch in San Diego sang out in chorus, "Well, what is it?"

"It's a big car."

Ah.

Perhaps the Amanti will muscle in because a few buyers out there haven't seen a "big car" they like or can afford yet. The Amanti is certainly likable, especially at its base price of $25,535, which buys a whole lot of steel and an impressive amount of luxury.

True, the Amanti makes do without the Opirus's heated and reclining rear seats, a must-have in Korea where formal sedan owners typically commute in the back. Kia has also decided against an optional navigation system, a feature that would have hounded the U.S. price over $30,000, the company says.

As is, the Amanti's deluxe specifications and attention to epicurean detail make it seem a steal. The car starts life at Kia's bustling Hwasung plant near the port city of Inch'on. It's essentially a Hyundai XG350 skeleton stretched another 1.9 inches between the wheels, 4.1 inches between the fore-and-aft license plates, and 0.9 inch between the door handles. The Kia's roof also rises, providing another 2.6 inches of beehive clearance.

You get power locks and windows, a CD player juicing eight speakers, electronic driver- and passenger-adjustable climate control, front power seats, and airbags galore, including curtain and side airbags for front and rear outboard riders.

The $1805 Leather package substitutes cowhide for a classy herring-bone-pattern cloth. It also sticks in an upgraded Infinity stereo with a six-disc changer and a dashboard LCD screen with a trip computer (a fancy analog clock parks there otherwise). Another $900 sends a sunroof scampering off the shelf, along with the heated seats and an auto-dimming rearview mirror. And $550 wires the brakes with traction control, stability control, and panic brake assist.

Spring for the $100 Pearl Coat paint and the $20 first-aid kit, and you've checked every Amanti box for a grand total of $28,910. Whatever will you do with the $4804 you saved over an identically equipped Toyota Avalon?

If your red mist sometimes rises on snaking roads, save a few bob for a set of tires. Like the XG350, the Amanti is blueprinted with an intricate suspension, including unequal-length control arms in front and multiple links with a control arm on each side in the rear. Hankook's contribution is super-fleshy 60-series, H-rated tires. They are whisper quiet down the freeway but roll over with a tortured squeal whenever you feel frisky.

Stouter tires would cure that, but they won't unearth a BMW where there isn't one. Everything about the Amanti says, "Easy going, son." The plush chassis is too soft, the 4117 pounds too weighty for the squishy springs and pliant shocks. The body can achieve real angles to the road, whether squatting on its haunches, nosing down hard under braking (a decent 177 feet from 70 mph), or listing to the outside in turns such as during its 0.73-g skidpad run.

Kia supposedly has tightened up the Amanti's handling for America, and the car doesn't shimmy or feel discombobulated over imperfect surfaces. But a few more turns of the screw might wake up the dead on-center feel and eliminate the wander through corners. As it is, turning from left to center to right only tingles your inner ear as the horizon pitches.

There's not much tingling of any kind when you dip into the throttle. With its cast-iron 3.5-liter DOHC 24-valve V-6, Kia extracts only 200 horsepower from a displacement that yields 270 horsepower for Acura and 245 to 287 for Nissan. The Kia's cams make do without variable valve timing, although there are sparks of sophistication in the Amanti's five-speed automatic.

No surprise that the 60-mph mark goes by in a loafy 8.9 seconds, the quarter in 17 flat at 84 mph. The powertrain delivers its go goods without thrash or shakes, the five-speed switching ratios easily and efficiently. Plus, there's basement torque thick enough to peel the tires off the line. The 3.5's electronic throttle often snaps closed with head-jerking abruptness, however. It's the one pointy peak in control software otherwise ruled by mellow curves.

Is it as fast as an Avalon? Do you care? Among a fleet of similar cream puffs, the Amanti holds its own, even without the off-the-line punch of a Detroit pushrod. And Kia, until recently a supplier of yesterday's level of trim and finish quality, jumps into today with the Amanti. The console pieces snuggle together with the tight gaps expected in a Toyota, the switches slide with the oiled precision of a Honda's. The glove box, the ashtray, and the front and rear ceiling handles, trimmed with thin chrome accents, all swing on dampened hinges. Search as we might, nothing inside tickled our cheapness sniffer.

An intricate web of seams and shapes is a sign of intelligent thinking in the Amanti's seats. Except for a slightly short lower cushion and negligible lateral support, the eight-way-adjustable driver's bucket (passengers make do with four fewer sliding options) slips on comfortably. Sorry, bench-seat enthusiasts will have to stick with their Avalons.

The steering wheel tilts manually but doesn't telescope. Left feet will enjoy settling on the wide dead pedal. The rear cabin has ample clearance for knees, legs, toes, and scalps, which also pass easily through the yawning door portals. A 15.5-cubic-foot trunk carts a full airport delivery, but Kia forgot to make the rear seats fold as in the XG350.

Minor flaws and all, the big Amanti fits America. Out among the waving grain are folks who love a good LeSabre, ache for an Avalon, or get hot around a Grand Marquis. The Amanti whisks together traditional luxury and Asian quality at a ground-ball price. Gosh, the kids grow up fast these days.

FRANK MARKUS

This car is a bit of a head scratcher to me. Kia and Hyundai are related, so I can't understand why Kia wants to sell a better Hyundai XG350 (which this is, derby-hat profile and Benz-with-a-'49-Nash-grille styling notwithstanding). It seems to me that every Amanti sale will cost Hyundai a customer, so similar are the personalities and chassis dynamics of these cars. The same lack of differentiation afflicts the Hyundai Sonata and the Kia Optima. If I were calling the shots, I'd reshape Hyundai as a bargain Toyota/Lexus fighter--smooth, quiet, competent--and Kia as a cut-rate Nissan/Infiniti--edgier, sportier. Most models would only need a few modest chassis tweaks. This Amanti would wear an "H."

RON KIINO

Kia's strong suits have always been more features for a lot less money and, of course, that 10-year powertrain warranty. When the Amanti arrived, I was surprised to see that No. 1 is no longer the case. Our example, equipped with just two packages, retails for $28,240. Not at all overpriced, considering that its robust V-6, five-speed automatic, and plush leather interior with power seats and automatic climate control result in a stellar cruiser. But not Kia's usual screaming deal, either, in view of a comparably equipped Toyota Avalon or Buick LeSabre, both of which cost more than $30,000. The Amanti still has the warranty on its side, but the price has switched teams.

DANIEL PUND

With its imitation Mercedes E-class headlamps and seat controls, its slightly squared-off interpretation of the Jag S-type's urinal-shaped grille, and an upright C-pillar cribbed from perhaps 10 traditional Anglo-American luxo-cruisers, the Amanti is the automotive equivalent of those TAG Heuer watches you can buy for $20 on the streets of Bangkok or New York. And like those imitations, the Amanti's movements reveal its lesser mechanical origins. It's just a big ol' cushy poofball with a bunch of equipment and a reasonably powerful V-6. But let's face it, you're not going to fool anyone, and at about $28,000 no street hawker would touch it.

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